This book discusses how the competitive environment of Latin America's social life has facilitated religious innovation in different regional and national settings. Pattnayak argues that organized religion has responded admirably to change and competition and will survive well in the period of increasing democratization of Latin America. In addition, the author shows how religious change that focuses on community organization, mobilization, and education of the citizenry carries wider legitimacy than ordinary political strategies. Readers of this book will benefit from its wide coverage of the Catholic and the Protestant churches and its definitive statements about the political capability of religious communities. An excellent text for students in courses on religion and politics, social change, social movements, and state-society relations. University libraries, persons interested in church-state relations in Latin America, churches and parishes that have branches in Latin America, and professors and scholars of history, sociology, anthropology, political science, and religious studies will all benefit from this concise and definitive look at religion and politics in Latin America. Contents: Social Change, Political Competition, and Religious Innovation in Latin America: An Introduction, Satya R. Pattnayak; Religious Change, Empowerment and Power: Reflections on Latin American Experience, Daniel H. Levine; The Transformation of Catholic Social Thought in Latin America: Christian Democracy, Liberation Theology, and the New Catholic Right, Paul E. Sigmund; The Chilean Church and the Transition to Democracy, Michael Fleet; From Theologies of Liberation to Theologiesof Inculturation: Aymara Catechists and the "Second Evangelization" in Highlands Bolivia, Andrew Orta; Religious Competition in Contemporary Venezuela, Bryan T. Froehle; Brazil: State Subsidization and the Church Since 1930, Kenneth P. Serbin; Latin American Politics: Exit the Catholic Church?, Jean Daudelin and W.E. Hewitt; The Embeddedness of Religion and Politics: An Epilogue, Satya R. Pattnayak; Appendix: The Institutional Capacity of the Catholic Church: An Evaluation, Satya R. Pattnayak; Select Bibliography; Contributors; Index.
Author Biography: Satya R. Pattnayak is Assistant Professor of Sociology at Villanova University.
